After long wait, Oklahoma’s 2005 federal pollution lawsuit against Big Poultry going to trial

Opening arguments to begin in pollution case

TULSA, Okla. — On a trip through the Illinois River watershed this summer, Oklahoma Attorney General Drew Edmondson bluntly revealed the main advantage he thought the state had in its pollution lawsuit against the Arkansas poultry industry.

“We’re right,” Edmondson said of the 2005 case, which names poultry giants Tyson Foods and Cargill as defendants. “That’s always an advantage in litigation.”

When the trial begins Thursday, Oklahoma will attempt to make its case that 11 poultry companies are to blame for polluting the 1 million-acre watershed, which spans parts of Oklahoma and Arkansas, with bird waste. The federal trial is expected to last several weeks, and its outcome is being closely studied by other states thinking about challenging the way Big Poultry does business.

For decades, farmers in northeastern Oklahoma have emptied litter from their chicken houses and spread the droppings on their fields as a cheap fertilizer to grow other crops.

But as the industry expanded in the area, so did the amount of waste produced — as much as 345,000 tons annually, the state estimates.

Edmondson, who is expected to deliver the state’s opening remarks Thursday, has said the industry took the easy and cheap way out when it came to properly disposing of the waste, rather than burning it as energy, processing it into pellets or composting it.

Now, the state argues, runoff from the waste spread on fields has polluted the Illinois River with harmful bacteria that threatens the health of the tens of thousands of people who raft and fish there each year.

“This case is much more than a war of words between attorneys,” Edmondson said Monday. “This case is about the future of an entire watershed.

“It impacts the environment, tourism, agriculture and public health,” he said.

The industry argues that Arkansas and Oklahoma have sanctioned the practice of spreading chicken waste on farmland by issuing farmers permits to do it. Oklahoma “is essentially at war with itself in this lawsuit,” said Gary Mickelson, a spokesman for Tyson Foods.

“The attorney general’s office claims pollution by the poultry industry, while the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture says poultry farmers and others who use poultry litter as fertilizer are abiding by the law,” Mickelson said.

The case will be heard from the bench by U.S. District Judge Gregory K. Frizzell.

On Wednesday, Frizzell questioned whether the case should even go forward because the state failed to name the Cherokee Nation — whose lands lie within the watershed — as a plaintiff. But he decided against dismissing the lawsuit after attorneys for Oklahoma objected strongly, paving the way for Thursday’s opening statements.

In July, Frizzell decided the state couldn’t win $611 million in damages because it had failed to include the tribe as a plaintiff. The tribe later filed a motion to join Oklahoma in the lawsuit, but Frizzell rejected the tribe’s bid last week, saying it was filed too late. The nation has filed notice that it would appeal his decision barring it from joining the case.

The other defendants named in the lawsuit are Cal-Maine Foods, Inc.; Tyson Poultry Inc., Tyson Chicken Inc., Cobb-Vantress Inc., Cargill Turkey Production L.L.C., George’s Inc., George’s Farms Inc., Peterson Farms Inc. and Simmons Foods Inc.